Many animals will invent new behaviour patterns, adjust established behaviours to a novel context, or respond to stresses in an appropriate and novel manner. This is the first ever book on the topic of 'animal innovation'. Bringing together leading scientific authorities on animal and human innovation, this book will put the topic of animal innovation on the map, and heighten awareness of this developing field.

Evolutionary developmental biology (“evo-devo”) may provide insights and new methods for studies of cognition and cultural evolution. For example, I propose using cultural selection and individual learning to examine constraints on cultural evolution. Modularity, the idea that traits vary independently, can facilitate evolution (increase “evolvability”), because evolution can act on one trait without disrupting another. I explore links between cognitive modularity, evolutionary modularity, and cultural evolvability. (Published Online November 9 2006).

Sociality may not be a defining feature of social learning. Complex social systems have been predicted to favour the evolution of social learning, but the evidence for this relationship is weak. In birds, only one study supports the hypothesis that social learning is an adaptive specialisation to social living. In nonhuman primates, social group size and social learning frequency are not correlated. Though cetaceans may prove an exception, they provide a useful group with which to test these ideas.